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- Volume 14, Issue 1, 2023
Journal of Digital Media & Policy - Volume 14, Issue 1, 2023
Volume 14, Issue 1, 2023
- Editorial
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Editorial
More LessThis issue consists of six articles that have already been published via Online First and two book reviews. These cover themes such as the sustainability of media business models, Audiovisual Media Services Directive (AVMSD) rules in the European Union, sport TV and public policy.
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- Articles
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The Watchdogs Network: A model for continuous monitoring of AVMSD rules
Authors: Stefanie Fuchsloch and Gerret von NordheimThe Audiovisual Media Services Directive (AVMSD) overhaul in 2018 includes video sharing platform services (VSPs), which provide content in an automated way, including user-generated content (UGC). This change is tantamount to a paradigm shift, as these multi-sided platforms differ starkly from the actors that had previously been regulated under the AVMSD. The AVMSD seems to have answered the question, what kind of rules we need. However, problems of implementation and application will not become apparent until later, and only then will it become clear which of the VSPs’ measures are truly expedient and appropriate. To know which rules are precise enough to provide legal certainty while also dynamic enough to adapt to technological developments, we need permanent monitoring processes – as described in our governance cycle. The prerequisite for permanent monitoring processes is fair and transparent data accesses, the design of which is also a fundamental challenge, as we will explain by the house of data access. Continuous monitoring processes are complex procedures involving many layers of competence. But they are also opportunities to timely catch and quickly correct misdevelopments. By implementing the two-step watchdog model in a bigger network, undesirable developments can be recognized at an earlier stage, because watchdogs are strengthened as information purveyors.
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Platform governance and the politics of media regulation: The review of the European Audiovisual Media Services Directive
More LessThe rapid expansion of video-on-demand platforms, such as Netflix or Disney Plus, associated with the advance of digital capitalism makes the Audiovisual Media Services Directive (AVMSD) adopted by the European Union a particularly relevant case for understanding the politics of the digital media policy. Based on an actor-centred constructivism, the article seeks to propose a conceptual approach to explore platform governance and highlight the key dynamics through which platform governance related to the media sector is formulated in light of the actors involved. As such, it provides an ‘in situ and in action’ view on normative building, introducing politics into the analysis of platform governance. The study focuses on the political framing of two key issues related to the crystallization of AVMSD: (1) the financial contribution of online platforms to European and national audio-visual content creation and (2) the presence and prominence of European and national audio-visual works in the online catalogues.
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Business models and sustainability in the newspaper industry: Perspectives from European and North American executives
More LessThe digital age has posed considerable challenges to media business model sustainability while diversifying opportunities for editorial organizations and journalists. The chaotic management of media companies is threatening the very fabric of various media industries. This article aims at understanding the sustainability of the media business models, and how media managers tailor their practices to cope with digital transformation in a competitive market. Media executives from three US newspaper companies (from the United States of America and Canada) and three European newspaper companies (from Ireland, England and France) were interviewed for this article. The results of the interviews with executives from the six newspaper companies interviewed suggest that there is a better adaptation to the digital transformation on the part of North American companies compared to European companies. All interviewed newspaper companies continue to face significant challenges in the search for ways to enable the sustainability of their business models to motivate their partners, shareholders and employees and contribute to greater diversity in the information market. The six media companies agreed that sustaining a media business and financing model is not equivalent to achieving the long-term sustainability of a media business model and financing.
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Media policy analysis and diplomatic interactions during COVID-19 between China and the United States in a comparative perspective
Authors: Fangzhu Lu and Biao LiThis is a comparative study of official diplomatic speeches regarding COVID-19, released by spokespersons for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the People’s Republic of China (PRC) and documents from the United States Department of State China Archive. It explores how these speeches and documents reflect the US–China relations and the conduct of policies surrounding digital media in the two countries. We focus on the period from the start of the Wuhan lockdown, 20 January 2020, to the city’s reopening on 8 April, and use several forms of content analysis to analyse the documents: Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA) topic modelling, sentiment network analysis and word clouds. We argue that the diplomatic relationship and political ideologies adopted by different political and media systems can have a major impact upon media policy implementation and guidance.
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Digital disruption and global businesses’ viability under COVID-19 (SARS-CoV-2) pandemic
More LessThe purpose of this conceptual article is to explore the drivers behind digital disruption that have taken the whole globe by storm as a result of COVID-19 (SARS-CoV-2) pandemic. Motivation of the researcher in constructing the article was to logically alert the present-day and future-world business leaders on how to respond to the digital disruptive forces attributed to deadly viral pandemics like COVID-19. The current article is based on the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Literature Review and Meta-Analysis (PRISMA) of secondary data sources, mainly peer-reviewed journal articles, the purpose being to draw conclusions and identify research gaps. It is based on a structural analysis methodology to frame the categories of the major analyses in combination with scientific rigour to a broad and complex problem. Research results proved that the primary forces driving digital disruption in pandemic ravages include technology dynamics, globalization and demographics. They evolve in successive waves. It is these waves that generate novel digital and technological disruptive megatrends. Implications to contemporary business leaders include bringing in present-day digital technologies, incubating survival plans of actions or strategies so as to fully operationalize businesses seamlessly. These may include, but not limited to, establishing technological innovation appetite meant to address, respond and navigate within the associated digital disruptive complexities. The study results underscore the necessity of understanding digital disruption and global businesses’ viability under COVID-19 pandemic. This is the first study to conceptually examine the digital disruption and global businesses’ viability under COVID-19 pandemic. The research contributes to literature and theoretical novel introspections into the depth and breadth of digital disruptive technologies and corporate strategy by an explication of how various corporate metamorphoses can lead to navigation and survival in such COVID-19 pandemic environments.
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Keeping it free: Sport television and public policy in Australia
Authors: David Rowe, Rodney Tiffen and Brett HutchinsThis article addresses issues surrounding changes in television in the digital age, focusing specifically on questions of cultural citizenship as they relate to sport on television. It considers the curious neglect of sport in the Australian Government’s 2020 ‘Media Reform Green Paper: Modernising television regulation in Australia’, especially given its focus on the current problems of free-to-air (FTA) television and the importance of sport to it. In Australia, as in many other countries, there is some legislative protection to enable sport ‘events of national importance and cultural significance’ to be broadcast without charge to whole national communities, thereby preventing their ‘siphoning’ by subscription television providers. These regulatory arrangements have come under increasing pressure, including from screen-based content providers offering over-the-top (OTT) internet-enabled, on-demand streaming services. The article considers the public policy and social equity ramifications of regulating screen-based sport in this dynamic media environment. It is argued that there is a strong case for an anti-siphoning list covering selected live sport events to be maintained, revised as necessary and protected from circumvention in an era where FTA television remains a popular, reliable and widely accessible media technology that has minimal barriers to viewing citizens. We conclude that television regulation in Australia cannot be ‘modernised’ by allowing the anti-siphoning regime to wither on the vine in gesturing to technological innovation, market de-regulation and unequal choice. Such interventions in national media and sport markets can, it is proposed, enable the necessary innovation to enhance rather than erode cultural citizenship rights for the benefit of large segments of society.
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- Book Reviews
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Netflix and Streaming Video: The Business of Subscriber-Funded Video on Demand, Amanda D. Lotz (2022)
By Andrew LynchReview of: Netflix and Streaming Video: The Business of Subscriber-Funded Video on Demand, Amanda D. Lotz (2022)
Cambridge: Polity, 176 pp.,
ISBN 978-1-50955-294-8, p/bk, AUD 32.95
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The Politics of Public Broadcasting in Britain and Japan: The BBC and NHK Compared, Henry Laurence (2023)
More LessReview of: The Politics of Public Broadcasting in Britain and Japan: The BBC and NHK Compared, Henry Laurence (2023)
London and New York: Routledge, 236 pp.,
ISBN 978-1-03231-038-1, h/bk, USD 170.00
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